In recent weeks Drupal community members have raised many questions about the Drupal Association (DA). Can the DA serve as an effective balance to the powers of the project's dictator for life, Dries Buytaert? Why does Buytaert have his name written into the bylaws with a reserved board seat? Is the DA structured in such a way that it could reliably address potential conflicts of interest involving Buytaert's company, Acquia? What's the history?

Community members have also raised questions about transparency in the Drupal Association.

In the absence of reliable information, speculation has been rampant.

These questions come as the Drupal Association has announced plans to facilitate a process of community consultation around governance of the Drupal project. For these discussions, it's especially important that community members have access to frank information and perspectives about the DA.

In this piece I hope to help address the knowledge gap by filling in some of that missing background. I have years of experience in the two incarnations of the Drupal Association--the Belgian-based VZW (the first Drupal Association, which I'll here call DA-VZW) and the US-based Drupalcon Inc (the current Drupal Association, which I'll here call the DA). This experience includes:

• I served as an elected permanent member of DA-VZW from 2008 until 2011, when its operations were transferred to the DA.
• I served on the first conflict of interest committee of the DA.
• I served on the first board nomination committee of the DA.
• I facilitated the process that designed and carried out the first DA at-large director elections.

That said, comments here are my own and in no way reflect the views of either DA-VZW (which, in any case, is now defunct) or the DA.

A bland backgrounder I compiled in 2012 may be useful by way of intro, but in what follows here I promise way more of the gritty detail!